T’puram: A key prosecution witness in the K M Basheer death case trial testified on Friday that the accused, IAS officer Sreeram Venkitaraman, was driving the car involved in the incident.In the court, Sreejith S, Basheer’s colleague and the 10th witness, also identified the clothes worn by the deceased when the accident occurred in the early hours of Aug 3, 2019.During his deposition before Thiruvananthapuram District Court, Sreejith said he knew that the Volkswagen Vento involved in the crash belonged to Wafa Firoz and that Venkitaraman was behind the wheel at the time of the incident. He told the court that he had given the same information in his statement to the investigating officer.The witness further said that the impact of the collision had flung Basheer’s motorcycle against the wall of a public office and that the car remained at the accident site after the crash.The court also recorded the depositions of prosecution witnesses Zulfikar, Navasudheen and Subair Khan during the day’s proceedings.The prosecution has alleged that Venkitaraman, then an IAS officer, was driving under the influence of alcohol when the car knocked down Basheer in Thiruvananthapuram, leading to the journalist’s death. The trial is continuing.
